During Apple’s WWDC keynote, the company updated both its iMac and MacBook lineup with 7th generation Kaby Lake processors, better GPUs, better displays, and so on – good, solid speed bumps all around. Nothing to get too excited about, but Apple has been inconsistent with keeping up with the industry, so this is a good step.
Much more exciting is that Apple also announced an upcoming iMac Pro – an iMac with incredibly specifications for its body size – Xeon processors, Radeon Pro Vega GPUs, all-flash storage, 5K displays, u to 128GB RAM.
The 27-inch iMac Pro includes a Retina 5K display, up to 18-core Xeon processors, and up to 22 Teraflops of graphics computation achievable on the high-end configurations. The iMac Pro also marks the first time than a desktop Mac will come in Space Gray, including the iMac Pro’s Magic Keyboard, Magic Trackpad 2, and Magic Mouse.
As someone who has a thing for workstations – whether from Apple, Dell, HP – I can say I am thoroughly impressed with the iMac Pro. Sure, it’s not a workstation in the traditional sense in that it is not upgradable and has a built-in display, but if you’re working in video, audio, animation, and so on, and are in Apple’s ecosystem – this is a seriously good machine.
The base price is $5000 for the base 8-core Xeon with 32GB of RAM, RadeonProVega56 with 8GB of HBM2memory, and a 5K display – which may sound like a lot, but for such a workstation-class machine combined with a display like that, it’s actually a pretty good price (a similarly-specced HP Z workstation, for instance, will probably be similarly priced, but won’t come with a 5K display).
The iMac Pro will be available in December of this year, and it’s good to see Apple pre-announce such professional products instead of keeping them under wraps until the last minute. Professional users need roadmaps for planning purposes, and it’s beginning to look like Apple is accepting that.
Correction: They said 18 cores not 8 as written in the osnews synopsis.
“The all-new iMac Pro, with its gorgeous 27-inch Retina 5K display, up to 18-core Xeon processors and up to 22 Teraflops of graphics computation, is the most powerful Mac ever made. “
Base model is 8 core.
….that crazy price should be for the 18-core
128GB RAM option!
$1000 of memory (I can’t actually find that high speed ECC ram for sale), $1000-2000 cpu, $1000+ GPU, and $1000+ display, $500-1000 SSD, etc. all in the base model.
That’s a surprisingly good price.
Not really. OEMs don’t pay anything like retail prices for components. EEC RAM and workstation video cards don’t cost much more than regular consumer components when bought in 1000+ quantities.
Edited 2017-06-06 03:47 UTC
There’s a thing called profit margins. It’s something that companies need in order to stay operational.
I hear your point, and I raise you “Gouging your customers for the sake of additional profit”.
I don’t buy that Apple with their clout couldn’t make a profit on this machine (specced out) at $3999. Might be slim though, give you that.
Why do that though, when the customer will probably pay more?
It is not the price for something you can buy right now, it is what this thing will cost in December!
I had a good laugh at the “click here for tech specs” followed by the “Processor: 8-Core, 10-Core, 18-Core” line (https://www.apple.com/imac-pro/specs/). This makes me wonder if they will actuall put in a 7th generation or 8th generation that should be available in December
This does seem like a machine many Pro’s would like, but no NVidia option and no internal (SSD) RAID for fault tolerance (or any internal/replacable parts) still means this leaves a big desire for a real “cheese grater” Mac Pro
Edited 2017-06-06 08:30 UTC
In fact… I did find similar memory (DDR4 2666 ECC) from Crucial. a 4x8Gb kit was about 450 € inc. VAT, unless I am missing something:
http://eu.crucial.com/eur/en/ct32g4rfd4266
I have a current Mac Pro, plugged in to my crummy, $200 (at the time) 24″ display.
I have a 27″ iMac at work.
The iMac is too big for my work area at home (desk with a hutch. I find the iMac big for my desk at the office. I have to bend my neck and look up to see the menu bars and corners.
This could be resolved a bit without the big bezel at the bottom. I’m sure I could get the company to pony up for a $300 arm and mount the mac on that, so I could lower it.
But it’s still too big. I honestly don’t need to develop on a screen reminiscent of a drive in theater.
I’m curious about the heat management of the 18 core super duper model.
My Mac Pro is pretty much silent, even when the fans are running.
My iMac is not, as its trying to force air out of it’s Dyson-like slit at the top if the iMac.
Now, granted, my iMac is a bit older generation.
It still has a CD Rom drive, maybe it’s better on the current models.
But I dunno.
I await the new Mac Pro. These are nice iMacs, for sure, but I’m still put off by the all-in-one nature of the machine.
Also curious how much of the options are only build to order vs being able to do anything save perhaps get some more RAM after it’s been purchased.
Still no updates since october 2014. 😑
So Mac Pro is no more. And iMac is the new Mac Pro… And when this finally hits the shelves, it will not be long before it starts feeling outdated. Apple once again proved they no longer give a f**k about desktop.
The Mac Pro is still being built, they said they would have more information re: the mac pro at the end of this year / beginning of next year. I think they are just going to offer to pro devices, the iMac Pro and the Mac Pro.
They said they have learnt from the trash can mac pro and will make the next mac pro more modular and able to be upgraded easily.
Pro.. More space? External drives.. Dongles..
Pro.. Display or GPU breaks.. oops you’re hosed..
Pro.. wanna use NVIDIA and NOT AMD.. oops.. can’t do that…
Pro… Hate apple displays and want to use samsung or sony.. nope..
Pro… Wanna do Pro audio editing? oops, we changed the ports and the way core audio works again so none of your audio units work anymore…
Pro.. want to do professional video.. oh yeah, you can’t put any pci cards in this to control muti-unit video switching for live broadcast..
Pro.. Apple.. no.. not really…
I’m still hanging on to my MacPro 5,1 cheese-grater… It sucks to use Apple stuff now…
If I were to be crazy and get an 18-core all-in-one, how much could I save on my gas bill? It’d b a true multipurpose device, both computer and house heating unit in one.
Seriously, I’m fascinated to see how they’d keep a machine like that from getting way too hot in that constrained space.
(somewhere in the future…) we used to have three designers.. now we have two.. one spontaneously combusted along with their iMac Pro when they turned it on.. they were just to close to the heat and power…